We are expected to share our prosperity with others. Kindly list the relations and other people, in order of priority, who may be entitled to receive our help. To what extent would this fulfill the need of our first priority before moving on to the next? What is the reasonable percentage of our income we should spend on our relatives and others beside zakah to be considered generous in Allah's measure?
Thank you for raising this subject which is often neglected. People often think that when they have paid their zakah, they have discharged all their financial obligations. They are largely unaware that Allah is not satisfied with a community which professes to be Islamic if a section of it remains in need while another section is very affluent. Everything in the financial and economic system of Islamic society is geared toward narrowing the gap between the rich and the poor. When Islam is properly implemented in a society, this gap steadily decreases until it totally disappears. Even when Islam is half heartedly or partly implemented, the poor are sure to receive help which is not limited to zakah.
The basic principle of the Islamic system is mutual financial and social security. There are numerous Qur'anic verses and Hadiths which encourage coming forward with financial donations so that the poor get their share of society's wealth. I will quote only one Hadith which shows the importance of looking after the poor, especially when they are one's neighbors. In this Hadith, the Prophet swears three times that a particular person is not a believer. Amazed and shocked, the companions of the Prophet wondered who was that person. He said: "The one who goes to bed having eaten his full while he knows that his neighbor, nearby is suffering from hunger."
Perhaps we should reflect a little here. The Prophet does not describe such a person as a miser or stingy or tight fisted. He describes him as devoid of faith and he swears three times to the fact. The action required here is simply to give a small share of one's money to alleviate the suffering of poverty within one's neighborhood. That does not merely testify to the great importance of social security from the Islamic point of view. It establishes a direct relationship between financial help within the community and having faith in Allah.
There are several verses in the Qur'an which specify the importance of being kind to certain groups of people. Normally when something is expected to be given to others, the order in which they are mentioned provides an order of priority. Therefore, we list the kindness to parents above kindness to travelers who find themselves stranded and cannot continue their journey without financial or other help. That is because parents are mentioned first among the group to whom we are expected to be kind. Allah says: Worship Allah alone and do not associate any partners with Him. Be kind to your parents, your relatives, orphans, the needy, close and distant neighbors, and to your friends, and to travelers in need and to those whom your right hands possess."(4:36) Among the qualities which make a person righteous the Qur'an includes being generous with money to relatives, orphans, the needy, stranded wayfarers, etc. (2:177)
As I said, this should be our guide-line in the order of priorities. The question arises whether, faced with having many of these groups in real need, one should give all help one can afford to the first in the group or should one divide that among all of them. This is a very sensitive matter to which we cannot apply a very rigid rule. The sensitivity may be on the part of the giver or the recipient. One may feel it is impossible to give all he can afford, little though it may be, to one needy neighbor and give nothing to the other, or to give to a needy relative without giving to any [other] relatives. Therefore, every one determines for himself how to divide whatever he can give away among those who he wants to help. His judgment should take into consideration certain factors such as the closeness of the recipients, their circumstances, their strength of faith, etc.
What we are speaking about here is voluntary help, not that which is obligatory, such as zakah, not what these people, or some of them, may claim as their right. Parents are entitled to be supported by their children if they are in need. This rule applies in all situations, whether the children are barely self-sufficient or indeed poor. A poor person cannot abandon his old parents who have no source of income. He has to share with them whatever he gets.
• Heresy: Death penalty — the conditions to be met
Is there any verse in the Qur’an which prescribes any punishment for any crime such as murder? I am told that the law in some Muslim countries demands the death penalty for heresy, even if it is suspected. What happens if someone is executed for heresy, but then discovered to have been innocent?
Verses 33-34 of Surah 5 may be given in translation as follows:
"The punishment of those who make war against God and His messenger and spread corruption in the land shall be to put them to death or to have them crucified or to have their hands and feet cut off on alternate sides, or to banish them from the land. That shall bring them shame in this world and in the hereafter they shall be sternly punished, except those who repent before you overcome them. For you must know that God is forgiving and merciful."
The Prophet, peace be upon him, has defined 3 crimes which are punished by the death penalty, even when they are committed by a Muslim. These are murder, adultery and apostasy when it is accompanied by seeking to split the Muslim community.
There are other offenses, which may be punished by death, if the judge or the ruler determined, in his discretion, that the circumstances of the crime call for the death penalty.
As for punishment for heresy, I will confine my discussion to the Saudi criminal law. This law, which is Islamic law, requires very solid evidence to prove any offense before it carries any punishment. No one is taken on suspicion. If one is accused of heresy, all he needs to do is to declare that he is no heretic.
If someone accuses him of heresy, he is brought before an Islamic court, which examines what he, says. If the court finds out that he holds heretic view, the court has to explain to him that these are heretical and explain where he errs. The true faith is explained to him, and he is called upon to renounce his views and accept the true faith. If he refuses, he is given time to consider his position. In the meantime he is given ample chance to reconsider.
If he insists on declaring his heresy and calls on others to follow his example, punishment becomes due. It is determined on the basis of what Islam considers to be appropriate in the circumstances. But all this is applicable if the man declares that he is Muslim and that his way of heretic thinking is Islamic. If he declares that he is not a Muslim, then this does not apply to him.
Could you please comment on the Qur'anic verse which speaks of woeful suffering for those who hoard up gold and silver and do not spend the same in the cause of Allah. I should be grateful if you relate your comments to your previous answer on jewelry and zakah.
Your reference to the Qur'anic verse is correct. This verse and the following one may be rendered in translation as follows:
"As for those who hoard up gold and silver and do not spend the same in the service of Allah's cause, give them the tidings of painful suffering. A day will certainly come when these shall be heated up in the fire of hell and their foreheads, sides and backs shall be branded with them. They will be told: This is what you have stored for yourselves; taste, then, what you have hoarded." (9;35-36)
There is no doubt that Islam does not like the amassing of wealth or using it solely for one's enjoyment or for leading a luxurious life. Indeed, all Islamic legislation in matters of finance are geared toward a fair distribution of wealth. There is no virtue, from the Islamic point of view, in the amassing of great wealth and passing it on from father to son in order to perpetuate a family's strong financial position in society. In the past, it was traditional in certain societies that the eldest son of a family was the single heir of all its wealth. Other children received only what their father assigned to them, if any. It is still the case in most non-Muslim societies that a man is free to bequeath by will whatever portion of his wealth to whoever he chooses.
Islam, on the other hand, has a fine and detailed system of inheritance which ensures the division of the father's wealth fairly among his heirs. None of the heirs may receive anything above the share apportioned to him or her by Allah, and none of them can be deprived of any amount of that share. The system of inheritance is only one aspect of the Islamic way of distributing wealth fairly in society.
What the Qur'anic verses speak about and warn against is the hoarding up of gold and silver, or money in general. Therefore, it is extremely important to know what is meant by 'hoarding' in order to avoid the fate of woeful suffering which this verse speaks of. Within this context, the question arises whether being rich is permissible in Islam or not. There is nothing in this Qur'anic verse which can be construed as forbidding the ownership of much money, or, more plainly, being rich. Some of the Prophet's companions were rich and we do not find any Hadith which tells them to get rid of their riches. Indeed, the Prophet, peace be upon him, received donations from such people and thanked them for their generosity. The clearest example is that of Usman who was one of the wealthiest people in Arabia.
At the time when the Prophet, peace be upon him, called on his companions to donate generously for the mobilization of an army to fight the Byzantine Empire, Usman came up with a donation which pleased the Prophet, peace be upon him, immensely. The Prophet, peace be upon him, was speaking on the pulpit when Usman offered one hundred horses with all the equipment necessary for a horseman to have on such a campaign. The Prophet, peace be upon him, accepted that and prayed for Usman. As the Prophet, peace be upon him, went one step down, Usman told him that he was donating another one hundred equipped horses. The Prophet, peace be upon him, again prayed for him and went another step down. At the point, Usman increased his donation to three hundred horses. The Prophet, peace be upon him, stopped and signed with his finger to the right and left and prayed for Usman and said this famous statement: "Nothing that Usman may do in future will harm him." This means that Usman would be forgiven any slip or mistake that he might do subsequent to such a great donation which amounted to the equipment of a full army by the standards of that time. There were other companions of the Prophet, peace be upon him, who were rich indeed, notably, Abdul Rahman Ibn Auf who was one of the ten companions of the Prophet, peace be upon him, given the happiest news of all: certain admission to heaven.
There is nothing wrong from the Islamic point of view in being rich, provided one makes right use of one's riches. Furthermore to be rich is not synonymous with hoarding money, whether it is of the modern currency type or silver and gold. The two are different.
What does, then, constitute hoarding? According to eminent scholars and commentators on the Qur'an, the payment of zakah makes all the difference. If one pays the zakah of his wealth on time, this payment serves as purification of the money and ensures that he is not included among those threatened by this verse. Al-Bukhari relates on the authority of Abdullah Ibn Umar that "this warning was applicable before the legislation of zakah. When zakah was made a duty, Allah made it serve as purification of money."
Abdullah Ibn Umar is further reported to have said: "The wealth from which zakah is paid is not hoarded, even if it is stored under seven layers of earth. What is in a person's hands is hoarded if he does not pay zakah for it." It is certainly the case that zakah is spent to serve the cause of Allah. This is true whether zakah is paid to the poor and the needy, or to any other class of beneficiaries, not merely when it is paid to finance a campaign of jihad.
If one pays more than the required amount of zakah and makes such payments for purposes which serve the cause of Allah, then he discharges all his duties and a little extra. We have to remember in this connection the Hadith which states that "a claim may be pressed against wealth other than that of zakah." Under this provision, an Islamic government may call on its citizens to contribute to any cause it deems to be of priority. When Muslims comply, they fulfill this other duty which the Prophet, peace be upon him, has mentioned.
As for the women's jewelry, the ruling is quite clear. When a woman has an amount of jewelry which is considered reasonable for women in her social status, and this jewelry is bought for her personal use, not as a means of investment, then that jewelry is exempt from zakah. Only when a woman's jewelry exceeds by far what is reasonable — and "reasonable" is estimated in relation to the woman's social status — or when it is brought as a means of investment, zakah becomes payable for it. For a woman to have gold or silver jewelry or jewelry made of any other precious metal or material, is perfectly permissible. It does not constitute hoarding. This is the opinion of the great majority of scholars, past and contemporary.
| Back | Contents | Next |